CHAPTER TWENTY NINE.
A MOMENT OF TRIUMPH.
"The old fellow has vanished; went on towards Arezzo the next morning;not liking the smell of the French, I suppose, after being theirprisoner. I went to the hospital to inquire after him; I wanted to knowif those broth-making monks had found out whether he was in his rightmind or not. However, they said he showed no signs of madness--onlytook no notice of questions, and seemed to be planting a vine twentymiles off. He was a mysterious old tiger. I should have liked to knowsomething more about him."
It was in Nello's shop that Piero di Cosimo was speaking, on thetwenty-fourth of November, just a week after the entrance of the French.There was a party of six or seven assembled at the rather unusual hourof three in the afternoon; for it was a day on which all Florence wasexcited by the prospect of some decisive political event. Everylounging-place was full, and every shopkeeper who had no wife or deputyto leave in charge, stood at his door with his thumbs in his belt; whilethe streets were constantly sprinkled with artisans pausing or passinglazily like floating splinters, ready to rush forward impetuously if anyobject attracted them.
Nello had been thrumming the lute as he half sat on the board againstthe shop-window, and kept an outlook towards the piazza.
"Ah," he said, laying down the lute, with emphasis, "I would not for agold florin have missed that sight of the French soldiers waddling intheir broad shoes after their runaway prisoners! That comes of leavingmy shop to shave magnificent chins. It is always so: if ever I quitthis navel of the earth something takes the opportunity of happening inmy piazza."
"Yes, you ought to have been there," said Piero, in his biting way,"just to see your favourite Greek look as frightened as if Satanasso hadlaid hold of him. I like to see your ready-smiling Messeri caught in asudden wind and obliged to show their lining in spite of themselves.What colour do you think a man's liver is, who looks like a bleacheddeer as soon as a chance stranger lays hold of him suddenly?"
"Piero, keep that vinegar of thine as sauce to thine own eggs! What isit against my _bel erudito_ that he looked startled when he felt a pairof claws upon him and saw an unchained madman at his elbow? Yourscholar is not like those beastly Swiss and Germans, whose heads areonly fit for battering-rams, and who have such large appetites that theythink nothing of taking a cannon-ball before breakfast. We Florentinescount some other qualities in a man besides that vulgar stuff calledbravery, which is to be got by hiring dunderheads at so much per dozen.I tell you, as soon as men found out that they had more brains thanoxen, they set the oxen to draw for them; and when we Florentines foundout that we had more brains than other men we set them to fight for us."
"Treason, Nello!" a voice called out from the inner sanctum; "that isnot the doctrine of the State. Florence is grinding its weapons; andthe last well-authenticated vision announced by the Frate was Marsstanding on the Palazzo Vecchio with his arm on the shoulder of SanGiovanni Battista, who was offering him a piece of honeycomb."
"It is well, Francesco," said Nello. "Florence has a few thicker skullsthat may do to bombard Pisa with; there will still be the finer spiritsleft at home to do the thinking and the shaving. And as for our Pierohere, if he makes such a point of valour, let him carry his biggestbrush for a weapon and his palette for a shield, and challenge thewidest-mouthed Swiss he can see in the Prato to a single combat."
"_Va_, Nello," growled Piero, "thy tongue runs on as usual, like a millwhen the Arno's full--whether there's grist or not."
"Excellent grist, I tell thee. For it would be as reasonable to expecta grizzled painter like thee to be fond of getting a javelin inside theeas to expect a man whose wits have been sharpened on the classics tolike having his handsome face clawed by a wild beast."
"There you go, supposing you'll get people to put their legs into a sackbecause you call it a pair of hosen," said Piero. "Who said anythingabout a wild beast, or about an unarmed man rushing on battle? Fightingis a trade, and it's not my trade. I should be a fool to run afterdanger, but I could face it if it came to me."
"How is it you're so afraid of the thunder, then, my Piero?" said Nello,determined to chase down the accuser. "You ought to be able tounderstand why one man is shaken by a thing that seems a trifle toothers--you who hide yourself with the rats as soon as a storm comeson."
"That is because I have a particular sensibility to loud sounds; it hasnothing to do with my courage or my conscience."
"Well, and Tito Melema may have a peculiar sensibility to being laidhold of unexpectedly by prisoners who have run away from Frenchsoldiers. Men are born with antipathies; I myself can't abide the smellof mint. Tito was born with an antipathy to old prisoners who stumbleand clutch. Ecco!"
There was a general laugh at Nello's defence, and it was clear thatPiero's disinclination towards Tito was not shared by the company. Thepainter, with his undecipherable grimace, took the tow from hisscarsella and stuffed his ears in indignant contempt, while Nello wenton triumphantly--
"No, my Piero, I can't afford to have my _bel erudito_ decried; andFlorence can't afford it either, with her scholars moulting off her atthe early age of forty. Our Phoenix Pico just gone straight toParadise, as the Frate has informed us; and the incomparable Poliziano,not two months since, gone to--well, well, let us hope he is not gone tothe eminent scholars in the Malebolge."
"By the way," said Francesco Cei, "have you heard that Camilla Rucellaihas outdone the Frate in her prophecies? She prophesied two years agothat Pico would die in the time of lilies. He has died in November.`Not at all the time of lilies,' said the scorners. `Go to!' saysCamilla; `it is the lilies of France I meant, and it seems to me theyare close enough under your nostrils.' I say, `Euge, Camilla!' If theFrate can prove that any one of his visions has been as well fulfilled,I'll declare myself a Piagnone to-morrow."
"You are something too flippant about the Frate, Francesco," said PietroCennini, the scholarly. "We are all indebted to him in these weeks forpreaching peace and quietness, and the laying aside of party quarrels.They are men of small discernment who would be glad to see the peopleslipping the Frate's leash just now. And if the Most Christian King isobstinate about the treaty to-day, and will not sign what is fair andhonourable to Florence, Fra Girolamo is the man we must trust in tobring him to reason."
"You speak truth, Messer Pietro," said Nello; "the Frate is one of thefirmest nails Florence has to hang on--at least, that is the opinion ofthe most respectable chins I have the honour of shaving. But youngMesser Niccolo was saying here the other morning--and doubtlessFrancesco means the same thing--there is as wonderful a power ofstretching in the meaning of visions as in Dido's bull's hide. It seemsto me a dream may mean whatever comes after it. As our Franco Sacchettisays, a woman dreams over-night of a serpent biting her, breaks adrinking-cup the next day, and cries out, `Look you, I thought somethingwould happen--it's plain now what the serpent meant.'"
"But the Frate's visions are not of that sort," said Cronaca. "He notonly says what will happen--that the Church will be scourged andrenovated, and the heathens converted--he says it shall happen quickly.He is no slippery pretender who provides loopholes for himself, he is--"
"What is this? what is this?" exclaimed Nello, jumping off the board,and putting his head out at the door. "Here are people streaming intothe piazza, and shouting. Something must have happened in the ViaLarga. Aha!" he burst forth with delighted astonishment, stepping outlaughing and waving his cap.
All the rest of the company hastened to the door. News from the ViaLarga was just what they had been waiting for. But if the news had comeinto the piazza, they were not a little surprised at the form of itsadvent. Carried above the shoulders of the people, on a benchapparently snatched up in the street, sat Tito Melema, in smilingamusement at the compulsion he was under. His cap had slipped off hishead, and hung by the becchetto which was wound loosely round his neck;and as he saw the group at Nello's door he lifted up his fingers inbeckoning recognition.
The next minute he had leaped from the bench onto a cart filled with bales, that stood in the broad space between theBaptistery and the steps of the Duomo, while the people swarmed roundhim with the noisy eagerness of poultry expecting to be fed. But therewas silence when he began to speak in his clear mellow voice--
"Citizens of Florence! I have no warrant to tell the news except yourwill. But the news is good, and will harm no man in the telling. TheMost Christian King is signing a treaty that is honourable to Florence.But you owe it to one of your citizens, who spoke a word worthy of theancient Romans--you owe it to Piero Capponi!"
Immediately there was a roar of voices. "Capponi! Capponi! What saidour Piero?" "Ah! he wouldn't stand being sent from Herod to Pilate!""We knew Piero!" "_Orsu_! Tell us, what did he say?"
When the roar of insistance had subsided a little, Tito began again--
"The Most Christian King demanded a little too much--was obstinate--saidat last, `I shall order my trumpets to sound.' Then, Florentinecitizens! your Piero Capponi, speaking with the voice of a free city,said, `If you sound your trumpets, we will ring our bells!' He snatchedthe copy of the dishonouring conditions from the hands of the secretary,tore it in pieces, and turned to leave the royal presence."
Again there were loud shouts--and again impatient demands for more.
"Then, Florentines, the high majesty of France felt, perhaps for thefirst time, all the majesty of a free city. And the Most Christian Kinghimself hastened from his place to call Piero Capponi back. The greatspirit of your Florentine city did its work by a great word, withoutneed of the great actions that lay ready behind it. And the King hasconsented to sign the treaty, which preserves the honour, as well as thesafety, of Florence. The banner of France will float over everyFlorentine galley in sign of amity and common privilege, but above thatbanner will be written the word `Liberty!'
"That is all the news I have to tell; is it not enough?--since it is forthe glory of every one of you, citizens of Florence, that you have afellow-citizen who knows how to speak your will."
As the shouts rose again, Tito looked round with inward amusement at thevarious crowd, each of whom was elated with the notion that PieroCapponi had somehow represented him--that he was the mind of whichCapponi was the mouthpiece. He enjoyed the humour of the incident,which had suddenly transformed him, an alien, and a friend of theMedici, into an orator who tickled the ears of the people blatant forsome unknown good which they called liberty. He felt quite glad that hehad been laid hold of and hurried along by the crowd as he was comingout of the palace in the Via Larga with a commission to the Signoria.It was very easy, very pleasant, this exercise of speaking to thegeneral satisfaction: a man who knew how to persuade need never be indanger from any party; he could convince each that he was feigning withall the others. The gestures and faces of weavers and dyers werecertainly amusing when looked at from above in this way.
Tito was beginning to get easier in his armour, and at this moment wasquite unconscious of it. He stood with one hand holding his recoveredcap, and with the other at his belt, the light of a complacent smile inhis long lustrous eyes, as he made a parting reverence to his audience,before springing down from the bales--when suddenly his glance met thatof a man who had not at all the amusing aspect of the exulting weavers,dyers, and woolcarders. The face of this man was clean-shaven, his hairclose-clipped, and he wore a decent felt hat. A single glance wouldhardly have sufficed to assure any one but Tito that this was the faceof the escaped prisoner who had laid hold of him on the steps. But toTito it came not simply as the face of the escaped prisoner, but as aface with which he had been familiar long years before.
It seemed all compressed into a second--the sight of Baldassarre lookingat him, the sensation shooting through him like a fiery arrow, and theact of leaping from the cart. He would have leaped down in the sameinstant, whether he had seen Baldassarre or not, for he was in a hurryto be gone to the Palazzo Vecchio: this time he had not betrayed himselfby look or movement, and he said inwardly that he should not be taken bysurprise again; he should be prepared to see this face rise upcontinually like the intermittent blotch that comes in diseased vision.But this reappearance of Baldassarre so much more in his own likenesstightened the pressure of dread the idea of his madness lost itslikelihood now he was shaven and clad like a decent though poor citizen.Certainly, there was a great change in his face; but how could it beotherwise? And yet, if he were perfectly sane--in possession of all hispowers and all his learning, why was he lingering in this way beforemaking known his identity? It must be for the sake of making his schemeof vengeance more complete. But he did linger: that at least gave anopportunity for flight. And Tito began to think that flight was hisonly resource.
But while he, with his back turned on the Piazza del Duomo, had lost therecollection of the new part he had been playing, and was no longerthinking of the many things which a ready brain and tongue made easy,but of a few things which destiny had somehow made very difficult, theenthusiasm which he had fed contemptuously was creating a scene in thatpiazza in grand contrast with the inward drama of self-centred fearwhich he had carried away from it.
The crowd, on Tito's disappearance, had begun to turn their facestowards the outlets of the piazza in the direction of the Via Larga,when the sight of _mazzieri_, or mace-bearers, entering from the Via de'Martelli, announced the approach of dignitaries. They must be thesyndics, or commissioners charged with the effecting of the treaty; thetreaty must be already signed, and they had come away from the royalpresence. Piero Capponi was coming--the brave heart that had known howto speak for Florence. The effect on the crowd was remarkable; theyparted with softening, dropping voices, subsiding into silence,--and thesilence became so perfect that the tread of the syndics on the broadpavement, and the rustle of their black silk garments, could be heard,like rain in the night. There were four of them; but it was not the twolearned doctors of law, Messer Guidantonio Vespucci and Messer DomenicoBonsi, that the crowd waited for; it was not Francesco Valori, popularas he had become in these late days. The moment belonged to anotherman, of firm presence, as little inclined to humour the people as tohumour any other unreasonable claimants--loving order, like one who byforce of fortune had been made a merchant, and by force of nature hadbecome a soldier. It was not till he was seen at the entrance of thepiazza that the silence was broken, and then one loud shout of "Capponi,Capponi! Well done, Capponi!" rang through the piazza.
The simple, resolute man looked round him with grave joy. Hisfellow-citizens gave him a great funeral two years later, when he haddied in fight; there were torches carried by all the magistracy, andtorches again, and trains of banners. But it is not known that he feltany joy in the oration that was delivered in his praise, as the bannerswaved over his bier. Let us be glad that he got some thanks and praisewhile he lived.